well done Qld Rally panel

[legend]

Below is a leter from the Qld Rally panel to all motorsport clubs.

Included in that letter is a cut and paste of a letter which I penned to the panel a few weeks ago. The panel has included that letter in their correspondence, as an example of the type of competitor feedback to which they are trying to respond. Their inclusion of my letter is not tacit approval. They do not necessarily see my views as providing a definative script for rallying, and do have not made statements as to whether they agree or disagree with any or all of it. The reason I say that is that the purpose of this thread is not to debate the pros and cons of my own opinions. its all been done to death. I'm sharing this information with the intent of showing everyone the Qld rally panel are trying to take action to produce the best results they can - whatever form that might take.

For better or worse, our panel is listening and open, a position for which I applaud them.

Originally Posted by Qldrallypanel

Barry Neuendorff,
Chairman: Rally Advisory Panel

13th May 2009

Dear Rally Enthusiast,

As some of you may or may not know the Queensland Rally Advisory Panel (QRAP) has of late been actively attempting to re-engage itself with the sport and its participants. By participants I mean officials, club members, competitors and spectators. In the last three months we have created our own website, set up our own group email and as of tonight we have had a major change to the organisation of the panel. This re-organisation gives each panel member a portfolio and makes that member responsible to actively engage whom they see fit to better assist the QRAP in advising Qld. State Council and managing the sport in general.

In the past there has been criticism of the panel due to a perception by some that the QRAP was aligned with or focused upon various clubs, levels of competition or having hidden agendas. As of now, all communication to the panel will be via the qldrap@qldrally.com.au address. When you send a query directly to this address it will automatically go to all panel members (and only panel members). Should you send an email to an individual panel member for consideration by QRAP you can expect that it will be immediately forwarded on to the entire panel. This will facilitate open dialogue and subvert accusations of conspiracies and the like within the panel. As with all bodies there may be correspondence that is either commercial in confidence or of a personal nature (e.g. harassment); in these cases you can be assured that the minutes will not identify the people involved.

We actively encourage anybody to send us anything they want looked at or discussed. This can be from a rule interpretation, car preparation, interclub communication, legalities and everything in between.

I would ask that you put your full name to any correspondence even if you do want it kept confidential. Anonymous correspondence will most probably be ignored.

To get the ball rolling I have outlined below an email that we have received from a competitor. The writer has given us written permission to promulgate it as it was sent to us


----- Original Message -----
From: Matt Martin
To: qldrap@qldrally.com.au
Sent: Friday, May 01, 2009 11:06 AM
Subject: QRC and QRAP stuff


Hi Barry.

Before I get into the nitty gritty of why I’m writing, let me introduce myself. My name is Matt. At risk of sounding too much like Andrew Crawford, I’ve been rallying in NSW for 18 years, mostly at state championship level, but occasionally ARC including Rally of Melbourne, Coffs, and Great lakes. I have been officialling at rallies and various other events since 1986. I have done most roles, from event director (state speed events, not rallies) to stage commander, pit official at the Bathurst 1000, and the Eastern Creek 12 hour. From time to time I’ve even found myself as event secretary, scrutineer and steward*. I’ve done events form motorkhanas to ARC. I’ve been an enthusiastic competitor and an event sponsor. (* I no longer perform these roles ever since CAMS lost the accreditation I spent days in tafe colleges studying and being examined for. )

So I recently moved to Qld, and would like to do the QRC. But there are a few issues with that. Issue upon which I would like to offer my infinite wisdom.

Firstly, the QRAP and most importantly, the QRC has an identity problem. I went to Rally.com and clicked on the QLD rally link. It came up with this:
“We're already two rounds into the Queensland Rally championships for 2001 and the big news is that it looks like Tristan Carrigan is going to give this championship a real shake! He has already won the first two rounds of this year's Championship in his front wheel drive non-turbo Laser! The next round of the championship is Rally Queensland, Which is of course Queensland's round of the Australian Rally Championships. So come up to Kings Beach Park, Caloundra on Friday the 15th of June and not only see Possum Bourne and Neal Bates and the rest of the ARC competitors but also see just how hard these young guys are going! “
I can’t find anywhere what I have to do to join the QRC. Do I just turn up? Do I have to register? If so, how? Where’s a list of events? Series regs?

Secondly, my observations on the series itself – its not going well is it?

The first round of any series is always your strongest. Everyone is still in it. Everyone still has a chance. As the year battles on, those who’ve run out of luck, money, or talent inevitably drop off. So the first round of this series – Rally Q. how may? 7? 10? The QRC is surely at a low point isn’t it? It hasn’t always been this bad has it?

So here’s some suggestions you may want to look at to bring competitors back.

1. Cost: Firstly cap the entry fee at $600. the $1200 entry fee for Rally Q is unacceptable to me. I can promise you its unacceptable to most state level competitors. The justification that it’s actually 2 rounds makes matters worse. If I can’t afford $1200 for a rally, I will have to miss 2 rounds. Then I’m instantly out of the series. By making this rally 2 rounds you are instantly and permanently alienating all the competitors who don’t like arc rounds. And believe me there are lots and lots of those. Rounds must be 4 weeks apart. 2 rounds on consecutive days. Who are we kidding?

The brutal truth is that the ARC is a dead duck. It can’t pay for itself and the QRC is expected to carry the can. If rally Q can’t offer a state round with a minimum of 130KM competitive distance for $600 then they should be told thanks, but no thanks. But what happens and what keeps happening is that the state panels continue to prop the ARC up. The job of the QRAP is to build and develop QUEENSLAND RALLYING. Not the ARC. They have both arcom and Rallycorp to try to look after them. Our rally panel should be there for us. The number one priority of your panel has to be the QRC. (and its underlings)

2. Event format. The average state competitor has a job. Or even worse a business to run. At the end of Rally Q (if we get that far) I will put my car back on the trailer and drive home - Direct from imbil - I won’t even have results yet. I’ll get it put away at 11:00PM get 5 hours sleep and I’m up at 4:30 Monday morning to fly to Sydney for work. Some time on Monday my wife will ring me and let me know how we went. Most people wouldn’t bother. What us state guys want is to do a rally, go to the club (or campgrounds or caravan park or mozzie infested swamp) and get drunk together. That’s what rallying is about for us. Its not about $60 a head presentation functions on Sunday night. We are not them.

3. Make it easy. If the event is pacenoted, then it MUST be Friday. Scrutineering should be done by any accredited CAMS scrutineer. Otherwise on the night before the rally at or near the rally HQ, and after recce. I personally think that promo starts are a waste of everybodies time and money. Make them optional.

My perfect state round – $500 entry fee. 150KM competitive. For pacenoted events - Drive up Thursday night. Friday recce. For blind events – drive up Friday night. Start at midday Saturday, finish 9PM Saturday night. Results and thanks on the night. Have a drink. Drive home Sunday. You put events like this back on the state championship, (exclusively I mean) and I promise you you’ll have dozens of new competitors.

Thanks for your time, and I hope you find something constructive in here, and I look forward to seeing a QRC worth entering sometime in the near future.

Matthew Martin





It is our intention that all correspondence will be considered and answered in an open and helpful way. Where we can we will ask State Council, CAMS, all clubs and yourselves to help with the answers.

So, how would you like us to tackle the above?

The question re the site has already been sorted... The plan with our site is to basically have it as a link site so everybody’s info is found there, either directly on the site or via a link. For those of you who are unfamiliar with site it can be found at

Queensland Rally > Home

We, as a panel are at a bit of a loss as to how to tackle the rest of the email. Quite obviously it was written by an experienced rally person who is unhappy at the state of the championship and more importantly the issue of cost. In a perfect world we could snap our fingers and come up with the answer, unfortunately in 2009 we are in the midst of a global recession. A common statement which you hear all of the time is that fields are at a record low and that this is due to costs. My panel and I have nothing to support this theory; we don’t have access to the raw data on which to even base an opinion...

.Common issues that we hear are

• CAMS are hard to deal with
• Entry fees are too high and QRC fees high
• Clubs are not looking after officials
• CAMS requirements on car and drivers too costly i.e. suits
• SE Qld not supporting the rest of the state

And I am sure there are hundreds of others.

We have asked that the “club liaison panel member” contact all of the clubs and forward this letter to you. By the very fact that you have received it should indicate our resolve to move forward with rallying in Queensland. We would like to conduct a poll who you the enthusiast will be able to tell us what it is that you want from your chosen sport. There are some technical issues to be sorted such as contact details and email address, how we conduct the poll and what weight each response has. It is possible that we may get access to the ARC/Cams survey data however, there is much work to be done.

This will allow us to present state council a factual, thorough and honest appraisal of your requirements. I know that some of you are already thinking that “oh here we go more committees and meetings, but will it work” I can’t answer that however, I will say that all the members of the panel are committed to making it work. That’s not to say that it hasn’t been a very useful tool however we are doing our very best to put a plan in place that ensures that you get the most bang for your buck. The whole point of advisors is that they put forward good information that is factual and correct. I promise that your advisory panel will produce good work; however they need your support and good quality information to act on.


You will note that our latest minutes are now available for reading on the web site Queensland Rally > Home

Please use the email address qldrap@qldrally.com.au to contact us with any issues that you have.


Best regards,

Barry Neuendorff,
Chairman: Rally Advisory Panel

[bob moore]

Exceptionally well done!

[Nigel]

Bloody hell, what a precedent!

[daewoo]

Never let the truth get in the way of a good story...

Originally Posted by LegEnd

I have done most roles, from event director usually while hungover (state speed events, not rallies - because they are too hard to do when hungover) to stage commander again, hungover, but at least I wasn't throwing up engine coolant like Fly, pit official at the Bathurst 1000, and the Eastern Creek 12 hour where I had to be disciplined by the group organising the pit officials for using a duck call instead of a whistle

Fixed

Cheers,
Daewoo (who passed his duck call on to his sons - stupid thing to do as it turned out).

[legend]

Originally Posted by daewoo

Never let the truth get in the way of a good story...



Fixed

Cheers,
Daewoo (who passed his duck call on to his sons - stupid thing to do as it turned out).

PMSL remembering the Duck-Whistles. That did impress the powers that be.

[tanz]

I opened my copy of the CAMS magazine this afternoon, and read in the new president's address "...engaging with our clubs and members with transparency in our custodianship of the organisation.". Maybe the times are a changing?

I've been watching the new look QRAP evolve, and I'm confident that these guys really care about where our sport is and are keen to look at where we all can take it. The best thing that I've seen is the open communication and the fact that no one person is capable of doing it all alone, so the allocation of portfolios for each member can only help for quicker and effective results!@

In saying that, Scooter how we going with the rego scheme?

Oh, and Matt congratulations on getting a reply to a letter to the QRAP!

Cheers Tanz.

[SHEPPO R.]

top letter from legend.... and top letter from QRAP.

while i dont agree with all the bits and peices involved.... its communication like this from both sides that slowly build the sport we ALL want.
I dont know about other states, but the QRAP has been a hard working and listening group for years.... and imagine all other states have been also.

good stuff all round.

Reg.

[tanz]

Scooter has contacted me regarding my query, so another thumbs up for QRAP.

[Gord0]

Originally Posted by tanz

Scooter has contacted me regarding my query, so another thumbs up for QRAP.

Tell me seriously...that they aren't really called QRAP

...gold

[triplecaution]

Originally Posted by Gord0

Tell me seriously...that they aren't really called QRAP

...gold

Could be a good reason why there is no Canberra Rally Advisory Panel

[Mike Cherry]

And who would want to be on the Rally Advisory Panel Executive?

[Crazy Dave]

Originally Posted by Mike Cherry

And who would want to be on the Rally Advisory Panel Executive?

That would be the footy players
Congratulations to the QRAP for taking such positive steps. Lets hope it comes to fruition and carries on throughout CAMS.

[tanz]

Originally Posted by Gord0

Tell me seriously...that they aren't really called QRAP

...gold

It has been the nickname they've been known by for the past few years, but as they now are moving in the right direction, might be time for a review?!